Pamela Anderson, once synonymous with iconic red swimsuits on Baywatch, recently revealed that, at 57, she finally feels comfortable in her own skin while wearing one. Speaking to Glamour, Anderson described the experience as “freeing,” a new sense of liberation that she’s embraced later in life.
Despite her image as one of the most confident women of the ’90s, Anderson admitted that her self-esteem was often shaky, largely due to the intense scrutiny she faced in celebrity culture during that era. “I feel like [now] it’s the first time in my life where I feel like if I’m wearing a bathing suit… I feel fine about myself. It’s so freeing,” she said. “It’s so crazy because sucking in… or trying to live up to this crazy expectation of what people want you to look like or be as you get older, things change”.
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Reflecting further, Anderson shared, “I’m lucky because I’ve never really had to worry about my weight or anything like that, but I just… [have] never been 100% confident.” The process of aging, however, has brought a new perspective. As a mother of two and the founder of a skincare brand, she has started to fully lean into herself and embrace a makeup-free look, even on the red carpet.
“You’re going to hit a crossroads in your 50s, and you go, ‘Am I going to chase youth? Am I going to be miserable? Or am I going to be self-accepting?’” she explained. “And it’s a practice. And it’s hard to say that you’re attempting all this if you’re still doing the red carpets and the covers of magazines plastered in makeup.”
For Anderson, going bare-faced is a way of staying true to her beliefs. “It’s important, no matter where you are in your beauty journey, to accept yourself as you are,” she emphasized. “And right now I’m having a big moment accepting scars I have or imperfections.”
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Whether she’s running freely on the beach or stepping out without makeup, Anderson’s journey towards radical self-acceptance and presence has become a transformative process. “This process is really empowering,” she said. “I know it seems a little bit crazy. I’m also trying to find myself and who I am, kind of, underneath it all and trying to peel back the layers.”
With her newfound perspective, Anderson’s message of self-acceptance is a powerful reminder that embracing oneself at any age is a journey worth taking.